Master Jalal Zolfonoon and the Silk Road Ensemble

• Event Date: Friday, November 13, 2009
• Time: 7:30 pm (CST)
• Location: Knight Auditorium, Spurlock Museum, 600 S. Gregory St., Urbana, IL
• Cost: Free Admission

• Performance

Join us for a concert of Persian setar music performed by Master Jalal Zolfonoon and the Silk Road Ensemble. Master Zolfonoon received his earliest musical training from his father, Habib Zolfonoon, and his older brother, Mahmoud Zolfonoon, on the tar. At the age of thirteen, the promising young musician enrolled in the National School for Iranian Music, where he immediately fell in love with the setar. In 1967, he was accepted into the faculty of the fine arts department of Tehran University where he would further study the setar with Master Noor Ali Boroumand and Daryoush Saffat. From then on, Zolfonoon dedicated himself to the delicate instrument, and began combining the techniques of the older masters of setar with his own ingenuity and mystic sensitivity. Zolfonoon is credited with introducing an ensemble of only setar players to the music world and creating the album “Golehsadbarg” (meaning "100 petal flower"). Through this album and his concerts, Zolfonoon demonstrated for the first time the power and versatility of the setar as both a solo and ensemble instrument that could fully express the nuances of traditional Persian music. In fact, since the success of "Golehsadbarg," the setar has changed in status from the least to the most popular instrument in Iran.

This concert is presented by the Center for South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, the Center for Global Studies, the Robert E. Brown Center for World Music, the Persian Cultural Association, and the Spurlock Museum. It is sponsored in part by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.